Sick Yellow Tang.. Please Help

[karmenkame]

Hi,

I have a 72 gallon tank that is about 8 months old. I have had a yellow tang for about 4 months. He has been very healthy; eating and swimming fine up until yesterday. I did about a 15 gallon water change and added 5 new corals. (pumpig xenia, button polyp, bullseye mushroom, stripped mushroom and cabbage leather) He was fine when I fed him right before the water change. He was his usual self eating and swimming around.

I did something a little different this time when I changed the water. I turned off all of the pumps and blew all the stuff off the rocks. I waited a bit for the stuff to settle to the sand and then I proceeded with the water change and cleaning the top layer of the sand. I acclimated and added my corals. When I went to feed them again later on in the evening, I noticed my tang was breathing rapidly and he was not his usual self. I can tell that there was something wrong with him. I woke this morning and he still appears to be the same. Is there something that I can do to help him get back to his usual self or am I going to lose him? Please help.

I checked the water quality, and it is all pretty much the same as always:

Amonia near zero
Nitrate: around 5ppm
PH about 8.4
Temp 82
sg. 1.026

All other fish seem to be fine although my falco hawk was acting a bit strange yesterday too. But today he is fine. Other things in my tank.... pair of clowns, gramma, goby, emerald crab, hermits, snails, hairy mushroom and a couple of mushroom leathers.. Any more info needed? Should I post a picture? He looks fine, but I know that hs is not feeling well. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[ATJ]

The thing that worries me from what you have written is your ammonia. It should read as zero. If it is not reading zero either you have some ammonia, which could cause the fish to breath rapidly, or your kit is not very accurate, which could mean that you have ammonia.

What brand of kits are you using? Can you get the ammonia checked with another kit, hopefully of a different brand?

[karmenkame]

I use red sea and salifert. The Red sea is not totally yellow it has hint of green which is why I say near zero. When I tried the salifert test, it states that it is < .5
It doesn't have a reading less than that.

The readings haven't changed. They have been the same for the last 7 months since the tank cycled.

[karmenkame]

Another thing that I just thougt about. I got the corals from LiveAquaria and there was a gel filled bag in the box which was probably used as some kind of ice pack. Well anyway, the bag had a tear and some of the gel may have gotten on the bags that the corals were in. Before I noticed it, my husband had already put the bag in the tank to begin the acclimation. I had him remove the bag and I rinsed off the rest of the bags and dried them before I floated them in the tank. I am not sure if any of this gel got into the tank. Could something like that poison my tang? There would only have been a small amount, if any, that made its way into my tank.

But he really does seem like he is drugged or something. He seems like he is just staring, unaware of his surroundings.

[ATJ]

It could be a toxin in the water, although I would expect the other fish to also show signs. You might try running some carbon for a few days to see if that helps.

On the ammonia testing, it might be worthwhile testing some new water for ammonia as a control for the kits. Of course, there may even be ammonia in that, but at least if the test colours of the new water and the tank water are the same it probably means no ammonia.

Have you added any new fish recently?

[karmenkame]

[i]
Have you added any new fish recently? [/B]

No. I haven't added any new fish. The last fish was about a couple of months ago. I added 5 new corals yesterday.

I like the carbon idea. I will try to do that. I do not normally use carbon because I use the ecosystemaquaruim sump,mud, etc. But I do put some in occassionaly since they say that it is OK for 12 hours.

Thanks... He does seem to be a little better swimming a little more but still not eating. I did see him poop... If he did eat the stuff, maybe he needs to get it out of his system. I did put a couple of drops of garlic in the water to see if that would help.

I will go put in a small bag of carbon now. Hopefully he will come around. He is truly my favorit and I hate to see him looking this way. :(

[karmenkame]

Hi,

Thanks all for your input. It seems like my Tang is back to normal. He is swimming around eating and enjoying life once again. He is his active little self. I guess he was spooked a bit or the garlic with the food and carbon to remove any toxins from the water worked.... I am not sure which it was but I am glad that he is OK now. I just wanted to post this update in case anyone else has a similar experience.